


Fish Are Dicks

by kyaticlikestea, LadyLilyMalfoy



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Crack, Humour, M/M, mystrade
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-05
Updated: 2013-01-05
Packaged: 2017-11-23 19:13:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,449
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/625617
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kyaticlikestea/pseuds/kyaticlikestea, https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyLilyMalfoy/pseuds/LadyLilyMalfoy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Greg has a secret phobia of fish. Mycroft, unaware of his partner's strange fear, has booked a trip to an aquarium for their first anniversary. Perhaps unsurprisingly, Greg does not react well.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Fish Are Dicks

**Author's Note:**

> Co-written with the wonderful LadyLilyMalfoy on a coach from Paris. We were both tired. This happened.

Once upon a time, Greg went to an aquarium as a young and impressionable lad and got totally freaked out by the fish. Fish, in his opinion, should _not_  have teeth, but many of them did. After a particularly nasty encounter with an Angler Fish, Greg decided that he would never, ever, as long as he lived, visit anywhere he could encounter fish again. This is why he refuses to go to European Markets when they go on holiday. It’s also the reason he turns a little green when Mycroft drags them to a fancy restaurant and orders the seafood platter (conveniently, Mycroft thinks Greg merely has a slight intolerance to fish sauce, and all is well). Of course, Mycroft, for all his omniscient ways, has no idea that Greg was once traumatised by a deep-sea fish, and Greg intends to keep it that way. It simply isn’t the sort of thing that tends to come up in polite conversation, or indeed in impolite conversation.

Really, when Greg stops to think about it, it’s not Mycroft’s fault at all that he should choose to take him on a ‘romantic’ date to Plymouth aquarium for their first anniversary.

Of course, before deciding where they should go, Mycroft did do an extensive amount of research. However, unfortunately his sources were far from accurate, being Greg’s brothers and parents – all of whom find it bloody hilarious that Greg has such an absurd phobia. They all assured Mycroft in complete earnestness that the absolute best place to go would be Plymouth Aquarium, where Greg whiled away much of his youth, swimming with sharks and admiring the cuttle fish and  _of course_  it’s somewhere they should visit together!

Mycroft took little persuading and immediately booked a nice little hotel on the Quay, just five minutes’ walk from the aquarium. Greg, oblivious to Mycroft’s plans for their anniversary, had questioned the location – “Plymouth? You always said that was in the arsehole of England!” – and Mycroft, eager to retain the element of surprise that would make the day even more special, had hastily backtracked – “Arsehole? No, Gregory, I’m quite sure I would never refer to it as such. Cup of tea?” – and all had been, to Greg’s knowledge, perfectly well.

Until now. Now, it is far from all right. He feels the furthest from all right that he’s ever felt, and he once had to investigate a triple homicide in a circus.

Above him, sharks and an array of rainbow fish swim in arcs across the overhead tank. Light shines through from the artificial fittings and dapples on the floor, painted bright blue. Mycroft, who until now had been beaming at the unnatural beauty of it all, is now looking at Greg with unadulterated concern.

“Gregory? Are you all right? You look rather peaky.”

Greg squeezes his hand in response.

They walk languidly through the rock pools and Mycroft attempts fruitlessly to engage Greg with a crab he manages to acquire. – “Look at the pretty colours! Want to hold it? Perhaps we should invest in an aquarium when we get home…”

Greg manages pretty well, looking determinedly in his peripheral vision so that everything Mycroft thinks he is looking at is blurry and indistinct, until Mycroft waves the crab right in his nose and a wave of sickness overcomes him.

The paramedic is very kind – apparently this happens rather a lot. Mycroft feels very upset and confused, and only a cup of the strongest Assam can mollify him even slightly.

Greg sits on the hospital trolley, feeling rather silly, sipping water from a polystyrene cup while the paramedic checks his pulse and the nervous aquarium attendant attempts to butter up Mycroft with an endless supply of tea, free of charge. The paramedic looks at Greg, and Greg looks at his lap. He’s spilt water on his upper thigh. He’s never felt less dignified.

“Look, mate,” says the paramedic, putting away his equipment. “I’m not going to take you in or anything. You just fainted, that’s all. But a word of advice, yeah?”

Greg nods dumbly.

“Next time your boyfriend offers to take you to an aquarium, you should probably let him know that you’re shit-scared of crabs.”

Greg sighs, and puts his head in his hands. He feels like a child who’s dropped their ice cream on the floor of a public toilet and got caught picking it up and eating it.

“It’s not crabs,” he groans. “It’s fish. It’s all fish. It’s their horrible, starey eyes and their slimy sales and the way they fucking  _flop_ , like they’ve got some kind of illness. How can anyone not be scared of them? They’re the turds of the sea, that’s what they are!”

“You’re scared of fish?” comes Mycroft’s voice from the other end of the ambulance, and Greg removes his hands from his face, heart in his mouth, and sees a rather crestfallen Mycroft.

Greg coughs a little awkwardly and attempts manliness. “Well…uh…” He coughs again and sits up a little straighter. It doesn’t help. “I wouldn’t say  _scared_  exactly. I mean…” He laughs unconvincingly. “Who could be  _scared_  of fish? They’re so… unscary,” he finishes lamely.

Both Mycroft and the paramedic raise an eyebrow and Greg sinks back against his pillow, cowed and blushing.

Mycroft sighs and pats him three times on the head with an affectionate mutter of “you massive silly.”

Greg can’t decide whether he quite likes this or whether he wants to crawl into a hole and die. Probably a bit of both. Myroft rolls his eyes in that endearingly put-upon way of his, and sits at the end of the trolley. The paramedic leaves, muttering something about the cleaning products being in the top shelf with the aspirin he’s about to use to kill himself.

Greg blushes.

“Sorry,” he says. “It’s true. It’s all true. I’m scared of fish, Mycroft. I’m scared of fish, and I can’t hide it anymore. I’m done living a lie. I hate fish pie because it tastes like fear, and I hate the beach because sometimes those small fish get between your toes, and I hate the stream in your back garden because the fish are brown and you can’t see them until they get really close and it’s too late to get away, and I hate aquariums because  _they’re full of fish!”_

Breathless, he finishes his piece and leans back into the pillows even further, crossing his arms in mock defiance. He certainly doesn’t feel defiant. Mycroft can take him or leave him, fish phobia or not, that’s true, but if he chooses not to, then Greg knows he’ll be stopping off at Bargain Booze tomorrow after work and drinking six pints of Carling along with his tears.

“You are a ludicrous, ridiculous man,” sighs Mycroft, but he doesn’t look or sound peeved. If anything, he sounds rather fond. Greg huffs.

“Not really,” he says. “Sherlock told me you were afraid of passion fruits once.”

Mycroft rolls his eyes.

“I was nine and I feared they were made of the blood of dead soldiers,” he retorts. He waves his hand airily. “But that’s not the point. The point is that it really is not that unusual to have an odd phobia, Gregory. It isn’t as though avoiding fish will be a complete hardship for me. I am not a sailor.”

“Or a merman,” mutters Greg, rather more petulantly than he intended, and Mycroft rolls his eyes again.

“Nor a merman,” he agrees.

They exist for a moment in a thoughtful silence, each contemplating the day – not quite in the reflective, romantic way he had expected, if Mycroft was being perfectly honest, but it was pleasant enough.

“Well,” he murmurs softly, running his fingers through Greg’s hair. “This certainly puts an abrupt end to the rest of my plans for this weekend.”

Greg glances up, a little dazedly. “Hmm?”

“Seafood restaurant this evening. Fish and chips tomorrow, followed by a cruise down the river… You can see the pattern.”

Greg winces and looks down, somewhat abashed. “Ah… Sorry.”

Chuckling lightly, Mycroft stoops to plant a lingering kiss on his brow. “It doesn’t matter,” he assures him. “We’re in a beautiful part of the country. I’m sure we can find  _something_  to occupy us.”

Greg twists around with a sceptical expression. “We’re in  _Plymouth_.”

Mycroft widens his eyes in mock innocence.

“And what’s wrong with Plymouth?”

“You once compared it to a bunion on the Queen Mother’s left foot. Unfavourably, I might add.”

Mycroft shrugs.

“I did take the liberty of booking a suite in the most expensive hotel I could find.”

“Then I fucking love Plymouth. What’s wrong with Plymouth? Fish are still dicks, though.”

**Author's Note:**

> To anyone following my (kyaticlikestea, hellooo!) other fics on here - updates will begin next week! Haven't been able to update owing to a number of factors, some of which are explained on my blog (http://www.teashoesandhair.tumblr.com). Thanks for your patience!


End file.
